2007/11/01 by David B. Audretsch, Max Keilbach · 647 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · #Business #Computer science #Context (archaeology) #Contrast (vision) #Economics #Empirical evidence #Entrepreneurship #Entrepreneurship Studies and Influences #Epistemology #Firm Innovation and Growth #Industrial organization #Knowledge management #Knowledge spillover #Marketing #Microeconomics #New Ventures #Private Equity and Venture Capital #Proposition #Set (abstract data type) #Spillover effect
paper · doi:10.1111/j.1467-6486.2007.00722.x
published in Journal of Management Studies 44(7), 1242-1254 (Wiley)
openalex publication_date 2007/11/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
abstract The prevailing theories of entrepreneurship have typically revolved around the ability of individuals to recognize opportunities and then to act on them by starting a new venture. This has generated a literature asking why entrepreneurial behaviour varies across individuals with different characteristics while implicitly holding constant the external context in which the individual finds herself. Thus, where the opportunities come from, or the source of entrepreneurial opportunities, is also implicitly taken as given. By contrast, in this paper an important source of entrepreneurial opportunities is identified – knowledge and ideas created in an incumbent organization. By commercializing knowledge that otherwise would remain uncommercialized through the start‐up of a new venture, entrepreneurship serves as a conduit of knowledge spillovers. According to the theory of knowledge spillover entrepreneurship, a context with more knowledge will generate more entrepreneurial opportunities. By contrast, a context with less knowledge will generate fewer entrepreneurial opportunities. Based on a data set linking entrepreneurship to the knowledge context, empirical evidence is provided that is consistent with the proposition that entrepreneurial opportunities are not exogenous but rather systematically created by investments in knowledge by incumbent organizations.